Understanding Scrum by SCARF Model

 

When we come to human behaviour we come to know that our brains react accordingly sensing the threat and reward. Even though previously the brain used to react at the same level for life and death situations but now with the evolution of the brain it reacts the same to human social experience which we will not consider a life or death situation. Research shows that the brain reacts accordingly to sensing the threat and reward situation. This can be considered a negative point for us as in today’s world we are dependent on it for our jobs well.

When it comes to scrum we have seen how scrum is a success from a technical point of view due to its simple set of activities, roles, and artifacts. In today’s article, we will understand how scrum is also a success considering the social neuroscience perspective. For that, we will use the SCARF model.

With psychology and neuroscience, we can know that some things are going on in our heads. We tend to make risky decisions we watch smiling faces, and our perceptions are also based on the language used. Our perception plays an important role when it comes to decision making whether it will be neutral or passionate.

As said by Roy T. Bennette, “The outer world is a reflection of an inner world. Other people's perception of you is a reflection of them; your response to them is an awareness of you.”

Five dimensions of human social experience defined by David Rock are as follows

·       S- Status

·       C- Certainty

·       Autonomy

·       R- Relatedness

·       F- Fairness

SCRAF model tried to explain how actions are perceived by the recipient. This SCARF model is explained in detail as follows.

Status

People always crave recognition. When someone feels dismissed, diminished, or ignored a neurological reaction creating pain is occurred in the brain similar to physical pain. Even though it doesn’t hurt like a physical blow but it is still treated with a similar feeling in the brain.

In the world, when someone feels ignored or not heard they consider themselves undervalued and then they will act negatively by disconnecting themselves from work, team, or group. Scrum doesn’t believe in hierarchy making it flat in status and adopting servant leader style.

Certainty

Brains function by predicting and having the certainty of the upcoming actions. The brain always works and keeps on predicting the near and far future. When something goes wrong from a prediction it shifts into crisis mode and tries to work and fix the error this reduces your productivity. When the actions and results are right as per prediction we feel good. Having plans and strategies resulting in its outcomes feel good but, an agile habit of rejecting decisions until required makes us uncomfortable. When plans and strategies go wrong brain is tricked into perceiving certainty and triggers a reward reaction. Scrums accountability creates certainty and other elements as a definition of done.

Autonomy

Even if it’s only a choice between two and having control over things we love it. We as human beings love to have control over things. Removing choices or options will create a threat signal to our brain. Even if you have autonomy comparing and seeing others have more anatomy than you will also create a threat signal. Agile teams work well with autonomy but when it comes to higher-level autonomy within the team may lead stakeholders to feel out of control and hence create a threat. To avoid this autonomy and alignment should be combined. Where goals will be defined together giving comfort to stakeholders. But still how to achieve the goals will be decided by the agile teams. Here we can say that scrum teams are self-organized and self-managed which creates a sense of control over their decision.

Relatedness

We still give high importance to groups and our belonging to them. We constantly evaluate whether people are friends or foes. If we perceive team members are not in our group a threat trigger is created whereas when we are among friends reward senses are triggered making it an important aspect. Agile groups have good collaborations among themselves as agile values it more in team members and customers improving their relatedness. As diversity occurs within a team the relatedness trigger is mostly important felt in minority teams. Scrum values guide team members in achieving a sense of belonging and building trust.

Fairness

We always want to see everyone treated as equal and fairly. As scrum is based on transparency and empiricism it provides a sense of fairness among the members of an organization.

As we have seen elements of the SCARF model and also how scrum creates a rewarding sense in all the elements of the SCARF model make scrum popular and successful.

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